For the past two weeks I have been wanting to sit down and write about the life and now death of my friend, my rough-and-tumble spiritual guide, mi maestra, the Chumash Medicine Woman, Cecila. I have been wanting to write, but not knowing what to say. When I first heard of her passing on May 15, I wrote, "I don't know what to say, but saying nothing seems so inappropriate"... I still feel this way, but I know that Cecilia would be on my ass to sit down and do it! Like the night she sat staring at me in her house after ripping me up and down about the state of my life. I was in a stupor, stunned, hurt not necessarily by her words, but by their blunt truth. It stung. And I sat in a pity puddle of woe and confusion, just trying to breathe. She put out her cigarette and quietly, yet purposefully left the room. She returned a moment later with a notepad and a pen. "Write!" she commanded as she set them down in front of me. As I stared at her blankly, she repeated, "Write! and remember that I love you, and that's why I'm here and why you're here."
She was terrifying and beautiful, kooky and breathtaking, appalling, and full of laughter. I often told others, "I don't always agree with what she says - or rather how she says what she says - but I always listen, because her words always carry weight. Even if I'm upset or hurt by what she says, I don't take what she says lightly!"
One of the biggest lessons I've learned through her death - besides that every death inevitably brings new life right behind it - is that fear is such a terrible obstacle to life. I've spent much of the last year and a half avoiding contact with Cecilia because I was afraid of what she would see in me and call to the surface with her bare-bones truthy words. I've thought of her often, but with a slight apprehension and trepidation... I never knew what to expect with Cecilia: would she be in a good mood, happy and laughing? or would she be on a zealous mission to speak her full mind, to empty every corner without censor? would she yell at me and tell me how stupid she thought I was being? Or would she hug me and tell me how much she loves me? I never knew... and in my brokenness she was both my greatest refuge and my darkest fear.
When I literally had no place else to go - alone and utterly broken in a foreign country - she took me in without the slightest hesitation. "Bring all your things. I'll make room. You'll stay as long as you need, as long as you want." And Oh! how her home felt like "home" to me! Always, in all situations, I felt welcome, comfortable, safe in her small oasis amidst the chaos and cacophony of downtown Ensenada. In the most real of ways, she taught me what "home" should feel like. And how it hurts to know that "home" is gone! But she would likely rebuke my tears! And laugh at my childishness... nothing is forever, and "home" is a place I need to cultivate and build within myself, so that no one can take it from me in any situation.
She gave me food for body and mind and soul. She housed my person and my heart when I was utterly bereft. She spent hours upon hours talking with me in what for her must have been the most basic and tedious of life lessons. She encouraged my art and creativity at every turn, pushing me when I didn't think I had it in me. She saw beyond my layers, into the depths of myself - she saw my potential and the worth of my soul and she would figuratively hold my head, forcing my eyes open so that I might see it too, and believe.
She taught me the true strength of a real woman, what real independence looks like, what real fortitude and strength of character is, and what true friendship tastes, smells, and feels like. She reached into the depths of my tattered life to show me what was of real worth and what was only folly. And most of all, she refused to give up on me. To the point of nagging, harping, harassing, she kept at me, refusing to let me fall by the wayside and drown in my despair and self-pity.
My heart aches for the space left behind by her physical passing. But I have so many memories, and I can already feel that she has left a wide footprint on my soul. I can sense that her death has stirred new life within my soul, real life to be lived by a real woman: fiery, intense, unapologetic, sensual, compassionate, and infuriatingly honest. I spent much of the last year thinking that my soul had finally been ground down to nothing, that the rest of my life was relegated to be lived as a shadow, a wraith, an empty shell of what I once was and dreamed and hoped. I know now that my soul is irrepressible, and the formidable spirit of my great friend Cecilia will make sure of it should I ever fall into doubt again.
I know I have a long, long way to go. There is much work to be done, but she has not left me ill-equipped. If ever I needed an example of something to strive for, I could not ask for anything more than she. I mourn the fact that I never got to say goodbye, that I spent the last year or more not reaching out to her, that I shall never again be able to go "home" to my spiritual haven on espinoza ave in downtown Ensenada... but I am forever grateful that she took me under her wing, that she spent hour after exasperating hour molding my dense mind and scarred soul, that she saw in me something worth her time and energy, that despite my many faults she believed in me. My life well and fully lived is now the only way that I can ever begin to repay her...
descanso en paz maestra. te recuerdo para siempre. muchas gracias por todo...
